Tag: SCHOOLS
5-year-old brings crack cocaine to preschool
PHILADELPHIA — Philadelphia police are investigating after a 5-year-old boy brought about two dozen vials of crack cocaine into a preschool at a Roman Catholic church.
Police say the boy told a teacher’s aide at St. Cyprian Children’s Center that the person who handed him the bag told him to hide it.
The Archdiocese of Philadelphia tells WTXF-TV that the teacher’s aide took the bag, which she suspected held drugs, informed an administrator, and they called 911.
No other children came in contact with the drugs, and no one was harmed.
No arrests have been made.
via: https://nypost.com/2019/05/15/5-year-old-brings-crack-cocaine-to-preschool-police/
Photo Credit: Getty Images
Students in blackface in two states prompt walkout
Blackface is causing outrage in Maryland and Illinois, where 1,000 students walked out of class to protest offensive images posted on social media by classmates.
The walkout Tuesday at Homewood-Flossmoor High School outside Chicago took place days after four unidentified male students posted a photo and video of themselves on social media wearing blackface while going through a fast-food drive-through window, WLS-TV reports.
Most students involved in the protest returned to class after a few minutes, but several dozen stayed outside to voice their disapproval of the response by school administrators, the station reports.
“The administration is honestly making it to be not a big thing and it really is,” student Karina Duncan said.
Another student, Kaila Chambliss, said she was pleased by the “big turnout” but wants school officials to respond appropriately to the controversy.
“I’m very happy with the results because this something that systematically is happening in America now and we need to see a change take place,” Chambliss told the station.
District officials, meanwhile, said in a letter to parents that administrators met with the students and their families Sunday, but did not indicate what disciplinary measures — if any — were taken.
“However, we can share that the social media postings that were seen and heard were not representative of the high expectations we have for all students that attend our school,” the statement read. “This type of behavior is contrary to our expectations, is being addressed quickly and appropriately and will not be tolerated.”
Students were allowed to take part in the walkout or stay inside, district officials said in a separate statement Tuesday.
Nearly 600 miles away, politicians in Maryland said they were troubled by two ninth-graders at Walt Whitman High School in Bethesda who posted an image of themselves in blackface on social media over the weekend, the Baltimore Sun reports.
“It is unfortunate for us to be in 2019 and these types of incidents are still happening,” Montgomery County Council President Nancy Navarro told the newspaper. “In light of this, it is imperative that we continue our work to engage in education and outreach to sensitize our residents on the harmful effects of racism on the residents of our communities.”
A Montgomery County police spokesman said an officer at the nationally ranked public school characterized the incident as a “bias-related incident” and the student’s actions were determined not to be criminal.
Byron Johns of the Montgomery County branch of the NAACP said the incident was indeed offensive, but has become “more normalized” amid rising political and racial tensions throughout the country.
“It’s part of the ether now,” Johns told the Baltimore Sun.
via: https://nypost.com/2019/05/01/students-in-blackface-in-two-states-prompt-walkout-unrest/
Photo Credit: LOGAN CYRUS/AFP/Getty Images
School allegedly sent badly behaved disabled kids to closet called ‘dark door’
Children called it “the dark door” — a cramped closet where disabled kids in a Brooklyn special-ed classroom were sent when naughty, according to testimony in a teacher-discipline case.
“We’re always put in the closet. That’s where we go when we misbehave,” said one boy who endured the cruel confinement at PS 345 in East New York, officials charged.
One classmate was put in the closet “to let the rats eat him … because he is a monster,” the boy told administrators.
“Sit down, sit down and go to the dark door,” another boy said kids in the kindergarten/first grade class were told if they acted up.
An investigation by the city Department of Education concluded that teacher Sherri Edwers, 30, directed or authorized a paraprofessional to shut kids inside the dark closet as punishment.
The scheme — which sounds a bit like “Matilda” headmistress Miss Trunchbull locking wayward students in “the Chokey” — could “instill an atmosphere of fear,” DOE officials argued.
The DOE sought to fire Edwers, who denied the charges.
But after a six-day administrative trial, hearing officer Mary O’Connell found the tenured Edwers guilty only of negligence, spared her job, and slapped her with a $4,000 fine.
The shocking allegations came to light on Dec. 22, 2016, when Assistant Principal Stacia Mason and an instructional expert made an unannounced visit to Edwers’ classroom, where she taught a dozen children, ages 5 and 6, with physical and emotional disabilities.
When the administrators walked in, Mason “had a feeling something was not right, but she could not put her finger on it,” O’Connell reported.
Edwers was seated on an alphabet rug with students, but the paraprofessional, Sachia Gaffney-Sharpe, was behind a smart board next to the closet.
Gaffney-Sharpe opened the closet door, and pulled a boy out by his hand, the instructional expert, Mia Williamson, testified. The closet, crammed with supplies, was dark, and the boy said he had been sitting cross-legged behind the door.
Mason said the boy then sat down by a radiator — “curled up in a ball.”
Edwers claimed the boy had tossed a pencil into the closet, and went inside to get it. But Mason argued that would be impossible because the closet was blocked by a smart board.
The principal questioned the child, who seemed “drugged up” by medication but confided that Sharpe-Gaffney had put him in the closet “for being bad,” the report says.
The boy said he didn’t cry or bang on the door.
In her hearing, Edwers insisted she never told Gaffney-Sharpe to lock kids in the closet, and wasn’t aware if she did so. Gaffney-Sharpe was suspended for two weeks without pay.
Edwers testified that some of her students had a tendency to make up stories or lie. She also said the boy found in the closet that day “was trying to stab another student with a pencil” — a claim she hadn’t made to DOE investigators.
Hearing officer O’Connell concluded that Edwers, even if she didn’t order it, improperly let a student go into the closet. The $4,000 fine will ensure the issue “does not repeat itself,” she said.
Edwers, a DOE teacher since 2012, still works at PS 345, and makes $73,112 a year. DOE spokesman Doug Cohen called her behavior in the closet case “completely unacceptable.”
11-year-old arrested after refusing to stand for Pledge of Allegiance
An 11-year-old student was arrested after refusing to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance and allegedly telling a teacher that “the flag is racist and the national anthem is offensive to black people,” according to reports.
The boy, a student at Lawton Chiles Middle Academy in Lakeland, Fla., was charged with disrupting a school function and resisting arrest without violence for the Feb. 4 outburst, according to Bay News 9.
He was also issued a three-day suspension.
His mother, Dhakira Talbot, said officials took things too far by arresting her son, who she said is in gifted classes and has been bullied in the past.
“My son has never been through anything like this. I feel like this should’ve been handled differently,” she said. “If any disciplinary action should’ve been taken, it should’ve been with the school. He shouldn’t have been arrested.”
The classroom kerfuffle happened when a substitute teacher, Ana Alvarez, ordered the boy to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.
When he told her he believed the flag was racist and the anthem was offensive, Alvarez asked him “why if it was so bad here he did not go to another place to live,” the teacher said in a statement to the school district.
The teacher said he replied, “they brought me here.”
Alvarez then told him, “Well you can always go back, because I came here from Cuba and the day I feel I’m not welcome here anymore I would find another place to live.”
She said she resorted to calling the main office “because I did not want to continue dealing with him.”
The student also allegedly called school leaders racist, threatened to get the school resource officer and principal fired and beat up Alvarez, according to an arrest affidavit.
He denied threatening to beat the teacher in an interview with Bay News 9 with his mother.
Polk County Public Schools spokesman Kyle Kennedy insisted that the boy was not arrested for failing to stand for the pledge.
“Students are not required to participate in the Pledge of Allegiance,” he told The Ledger.
The sixth-grader was collared “after becoming disruptive and refusing to follow repeated instructions by school staff and law enforcement,” he added.
Kennedy said he couldn’t discuss the boy’s discipline. Alvarez will no longer work as a substitute teacher in Polk County, he said.
“Our HR department will contact Kelly Services, which provides our substitutes, to further refine how our substitutes are trained,” Kennedy said.
via: https://nypost.com/2019/02/17/11-year-old-arrested-after-refusing-to-stand-for-pledge-of-allegiance/
School bus driver fired for letting kids take the wheel
A school bus driver in Indiana was fired after a shocking video emerged showing her let students get behind the wheel, according to reports.
Joandrea McAtee, 27, faces charges for allowing kids as young as 11 years old drive the bus as they dropped off students Thursday from a Porter Township school, according to the Chicago Tribune.
The Porter County Sheriff’s Department said at least three students got a turn driving short distances in Lake Eliza.
“Welcome to Boone grove where we let 6th graders drive a bus with children on it,” a student posted to Twitter, along with a video of the alleged incident.
Authorities launched an investigation Thursday after a parent reported the bus driver to the school resource officer.
“The students and parents that immediately came forward with this information should be commended for doing exactly what we teach, which is see something, say something,” Sheriff David Reynolds said in a statement.
McAtee was arrested Friday when she visited the school bus barn to pick up her final paycheck. She was booked at Porter County Jail on charges for neglect of a dependent.
via: https://nypost.com/2018/09/24/school-bus-driver-fired-for-allegedly-letting-kids-take-the-wheel/
School superintendent on Texans star: ‘You can’t count on a black QB’
A school superintendent in Texas said he thought he was sending a private message when he wrote a public Facebook post blasting Houston Texans quarterback Deshaun Watson, stating, “you can’t count on a black quarterback.”
Lynn Redden, superintendent of the Onalaska Independent School District, made the comment in reference to the final play of the Texans’ 20-17 loss on Sunday to the Tennessee Titans during which Watson held onto the ball before completing a pass to receiver DeAndre Hopkins as time expired, leaving no time to try a last-second, game-tying field goal.
“That may have been the most inept quarterback decision I’ve seen in the NFL,” Redden wrote on a Facebook post promoting a Houston Chronicle story about the game. “When you need precision decision making you can’t count on a black quarterback.”
But Redden didn’t realize that the post was public. He later deleted his comment and told the Chronicle he wishes he never shared that sentiment.
“I totally regret it,” Redden told the newspaper.
Redden, who oversees 1,130 students and 175 staffers as the district’s superintendent, did not immediately return a message seeking comment from The Post early Tuesday. He had not faced any discipline in connection with the remark as of Monday afternoon but told the Chronicle he understands how people may consider it to be racist.
Redden said he was referring to the statistical success of black quarterbacks in the NFL.
“Over the history of the NFL, they have had limited success,” he told the newspaper.
Doug Williams in 1988 became the league’s first black quarterback to lead his team to a championship, taking the Washington Redskins over the Denver Broncos in Super Bowl XXII. Williams, who started the season as a backup, was named the game’s MVP after completing 18-of-29 passes for 340 yards and four touchdowns.
More recently, in 2014, Seattle Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson became the second black quarterback to win it all, beating the Denver Broncos 43-8 in his second season as a pro.
The eagle-eyed reader who caught Redden’s comment, meanwhile, said he hopes there are repercussions to follow.
“It’s important to make sure horrible words are met with consequences, especially for those in powerful positions with influence,” reader Matt Erickson told the newspaper.
Watson, for his part, said the Titans simply countered with “good coverage” during the game’s waning seconds, according to ESPN.
Asked if he should’ve thrown the ball away earlier, he said: “Of course.
“But while you’re playing … you can sit back and sit in your seats and say that I needed to throw the ball away,” Watson said. “But we tried to take a shot and we didn’t have any timeouts and they guarded the sideline very well. So my instincts took over and tried to get the ball and time ran out.”
Coach Bill O’Brien instead took most of the blame.
“We’re just trying to get it into field goal range and just trying to — we’ve got to do a better job of coaching that play up,” O’Brien told reporters.
via: https://nypost.com/2018/09/18/school-superintendent-on-texans-star-you-cant-count-on-a-black-qb/
Bystander shoots gunman who opened fire at back-to-school event
Shocking video shows pandemonium breaking out at a Florida back-to-school event as a gunman opens fire.
A bystander shot the gunman, who was hospitalized with life-threatening injuries Saturday after the incident at the “Peace in the City” event in Titusville, police said.
Facebook Live video shot by Dwight Harvey shows women and children rushing frantically into a park pavilion as rapid gunshots ring out.
People can be heard crying and shrieking and one woman in a red shirt can be seen shaking as she clutches a child’s hand and says: “It happened right where we were standing, right there.”
Police said the gunman got into a fistfight at Isaac Campbell Park and returned with a weapon several minutes later, unleashing 12 rounds, WFTV-9 reported.
The good Samaritan, an unidentified vendor, drew his licensed, concealed handgun and fired at the assailant, who was running toward the crowd, according to Florida Today.
The bystander waited for police and was cooperating with the probe, officials said. He was not expected to face any charges.
“We are extremely grateful that nobody else was injured in this incident,” said Deputy Chief Todd Hutchinson. “This suspect opened fire at a crowded public park, this could have been so much worse.”
“Peace in the City” was a backpack giveaway event organized by Harvey’s son, to honor a cousin who was found dead in a burning car in Mims in July.
In Harvey’s video, children can be seen rummaging through backpacks filled with school supplies shortly before the shots erupt.
“We were just trying to do something positive for the community,” he said.
via: https://nypost.com/2018/08/06/bystander-shoots-gunman-who-opened-fire-at-back-to-school-event/
‘Mommy, I can’t breathe. This man was trying to kill me!’ School bus driver brawls with boy in video
A Florida bus driver was caught on camera in a physical altercation with a teen that had students begging the man to cut it out.
The video showed students breaking up a scuffle between the driver and an 13-year-old boy last week on an Aventura Waterways Preparatory school bus, according to news station WPLG.
After a shouting match, the student walked away down the aisle. But within moments, the driver was seen grabbing his collar and pressing him up against a window.
The teen’s mom Diana Cowan said that she was shocked to learn the driver physically assaulted her son.
“He said, ‘Mommy, I can’t breathe. This man was trying to kill me,’” Cowan told WPLG.
Cowan said that she’s concerned for her son and the other students.
“The anger that I saw in the video and how he handled my son, I’m very concerned for other kids,” Cowan said. “I’m concerned that this driver could hurt other children, I mean, worse than how he hurt my son.”
The school district said that the bus driver has been reassigned and they’re investigating the incident.
“Miami-Dade County Public Schools is taking this allegation, which first surfaced last week, very seriously,” spokeswoman Daisy Gonzalez-Diego said in a statement to WPLG. “We regard our students’ wellbeing among our top priorities. The employee has been reassigned while we conduct a thorough investigation into this matter.”
via: http://nypost.com/2017/10/18/i-cant-breathe-school-bus-driver-brawls-with-boy-in-video/
School Principal who had sex ‘dungeon’ in school’s office gets prison
A depraved British principal busted for ripping off tens of thousands of dollars from his school kept a secret sex lair inside his office, stocking it with a tawdry array of adult toys and booze, a court heard at his sentencing this week.
James Stewart, the principal and headteacher of Sawtry Village Academy for almost 30 years, was sentenced to four years in prison Thursday after pleading guilty last year to fraud, and misuse of office — for canoodling with his married assistant on campus, drinking during the day, and taking ski breaks and racing trips.
Witnesses at his trial said they would hear suspicious noises emanating from the “dungeon” he crafted in his inner office, including “rhythmic moaning and banging.”
The two were also seen “in a disheveled state with red wine stains around their mouths,” the Cambridge News reported.
Stewart’s office had a series of rooms that were lined with custom-made oak and glass shelving, furniture and doors, which were installed while the school went without inspections for asbestos and other checks.
Behind those doors, police found shelves of booze, a minifridge stocked with wine, adult toys — including a large purple vibrator — along with sex games, watermelon lubricant, condoms, a large packet of penis straws and coasters with scenes from the Karma Sutra on them. There were piles of cushions that might be spread on the floor like a bed. Two more vibrators were found in a desk drawer, officials said.
The principal, now 72, spent some $7,500 on hotel stays in London, during which he bought the adult toys, all paid for on his school credit card. He also racked up bills totaling about $65,000 on food and drink, including alcohol, in restaurants near his home, and ran up $14,000 in charges on electronics, including at least three TVs, DVD players, cameras and laptops, officials said. School funds were also used to pay personal expenses like car insurance and newspaper and magazine subscriptions.
When he was at the school, Stewart was often holed up in his office, and regularly drank heavily during the school day. He also frequently left the school to watch horse racing and to take ski trips, some of which were charged to the school.
Stewart, nabbed in 2014 after whistleblowing staff members reported his seedy conduct to British education authorities, has so far repaid the school about $100,000 of the $162,000 he ripped off.
Ex-vice principal Alan Stevens, 66, also admitted fraud after he was found to have hit the school with bogus expense and credit card claims worth about $600. He was sentenced to 24 weeks in prison, but it was suspended for 12 months.
The school was left in a “dire financial” position by the fraud, and had lost staff and was placed under special supervision by the time Stewart’s exploits were uncovered in 2014.
via: http://nypost.com/2017/10/07/principal-who-had-sex-dungeon-in-office-gets-prison/